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  “Good going, sir,” Grey said proudly. “I’d say you scored some points today.”

  “And I haven’t done a damn thing,” Daren said with a wry smile. “Shit, if I ever thought being a squadron commander was as easy as just treating the troops like professionals, I’d have done it a long time ago.”

  Grey led Daren on the power-off preflight in the cockpit, then back down the tall entry ladder to do a walk-around inspection. This was the most bizarre experience—getting ready to fly an aircraft while underground. Afterward, when the two weapons loaders had met up with them, Grey briefed the flight and ground crews on their departure procedures, and then they climbed up inside the bomber.

  While Grey made sure Banyan and Meadows were properly strapped in and were given a safety and procedures briefing on the ejection and escape equipment—most of which the two B-1 veterans seemed very aware of already—Daren moved forward and began to “build his nest”—put all his checklists, charts, and gear in exactly the places he wanted them. Grey ran through a quick console orientation—quick because there was very little to review. The system was so automated that there were very few human-activated switches left. “We monitor and check everything,” Zane said, “and let the computers do their thing. Two minutes to power-up. The computer does power-on checks itself on the mission schedule. Make sure you’re ready—things happen fast from here on. Sing out if you see any anomalies. Otherwise, sit back and enjoy the ride.”

  As power-up time approached, Daren silently prayed the old airman’s prayer: God, please don’t let me screw up. “O-kay,” Daren said nervously.

  “Crew, this is Bobcat Two-three,” the computer spoke a few moments later. “Check in when ready for power-up.”

  “Bobcat Two-three, AC is ready for power-up.”

  “A ‘please’ would be nice,” Daren quipped. He keyed his mike button and spoke, “Bobcat Two-three, MC is ready for power-up.”

  “Power-up commencing,” the computer responded, and immediately the monitors on the back wall came to life and lines and lines of computer reports started to scroll across the screens as the computer ran through its built-in checks. Daren watched, absolutely fascinated, as the aircraft proceeded with its power-on system checks. The before-engine-start checklist ran the same way as the power-on checklist. Less than five minutes later, the computer reported ready for engine start.

  “So far so good, guys,” Grey said after the computer completed its checks. “Ready for a tow to the surface.” Engines were not started, and aircraft did not taxi on their own power, inside the Lair unless absolutely necessary. After Grey called the flight leader and reported ready, ground crews hooked a tow bar up to the bomber’s nose gear and pulled the bomber out of its parking spot with a large aircraft tug.

  Moving inside the Lair, Daren thought, was like driving a big SUV inside an underground parking garage with very low ceilings—it seemed as if every girder and piece of concrete above them was sure to hit the vertical stabilizer, and even with the wings fully swept, the wingtips seemed to pass just a few inches away from the other parked jets. He instinctively ducked his head when approaching a structural crosspiece in the ceiling.

  Daren saw B-52 bombers as they were towed past, including a couple with huge rounded-nose turrets. “Those must be the Dragons,” he said. “Airborne lasers on B-52 bombers. Incredible.”

  “Yep,” Grey said. “Fucking amazing jets. They’re still Strato-Pigs, but—my God—when that laser lets go, it still sends a chill down my spine.”

  “Who’s the squadron commander?”

  “Colonel Nancy Cheshire,” Zane replied. “She’s one of General McLanahan’s test pilots from Dreamland. The Fifty-second Squadron is technically not activated yet, but they’re organized and run just like the other flying units. Just two aircraft, and neither will be mission-ready for at least another year, but they’ve already flown a bunch of sorties, and we know they work. I’d like to have one on every sortie I fly over Indian country,” Zane added.

  The Vampire was pulled alongside the lead EB-1C bomber, and the tow bars were disconnected. “Okay, we’ll motor up to level two and start engines there,” Zane said. Level two had special exhaust chambers that channeled the exhaust away more efficiently than did the passive system used in the main complex. “After that, the computer will do the before-takeoff checks, then motor up to the surface, get a last-chance inspection, and then we go.” It was weird to be staring straight ahead at solid rock directly in front of the EB-1C’s windscreen, and Daren was thankful when the engines were started, the last of the pre-takeoff checklists were done, and they were raised all the way to the surface.

  It was mostly sunny but windy on the surface, with an occasional cloud of dust blowing past the windscreen. “Lovely day in Battle Mountain, guys,” Grey said. They noticed that Rebecca Furness and John Long themselves were doing the last-chance inspection—Daren could still see Long scowling at him from inside the car.

  “Bobcat flight.”

  “Two’s ready,” Grey replied. On intercom: “Ready, guys?”

  “MC is ready,” Daren announced.

  “Banyan ready.”

  “Meadows ready. Let’s light this candle!”

  “MC, you have the aircraft,” Zane announced.

  “Me? Are you kidding?”

  “Best way to learn, sir,” Grey said. “No matter how much you want to freelance the training program, sir, you’re going to have to do a check ride, and part of the check for the MC is a takeoff, landing, stabilized precontact position behind the tanker, instrument approach, and visual approach. Might as well get as much stick time as you can.”

  “Too bad takeoffs aren’t automated, too, like everything else,” Daren commented.

  “They are,” Grey said. “The system actually does a very good formation takeoff. But we don’t do autotakeoffs or much formation stuff anymore. Besides, I like hand-flying the jet every mission, and takeoff seems like a good time to do it. Doing takeoffs is a good way to get a feel for the jet. Besides, if the system decides to burp on takeoff, there’s less chance of an accident.”

  “In that case how about I just watch the first one?”

  “I’ll watch your gauges,” Grey urged him. “Take thirty-second spacing behind the leader, fan right twenty degrees, turn when he makes his turn, and go into trail on him. I’ll be right here if you need me, sir. We’ll fly with the mission-adaptive stuff on—you won’t believe how smooth and easy it is.”

  “I haven’t done a takeoff in many, many moons,” Mace muttered.

  “It’s as simple as becoming aware of when she’s ready to fly,” Grey said encouragingly. “We know what the book says the takeoff run should be, and it’s pretty accurate, but the Vampire is like a thoroughbred racehorse—you’ve got to be sensitive to when it’s hesitant, when it’s ready to run, and when to give it full rein. Rotate around one-fifty, climb to one or two hundred feet in ground effect, raise the gear, and then lower the nose until we reach three hundred knots. Once you hit three hundred, raise the nose and maintain three-fifty. As long as you maintain at least two thousand feet per minute, which should be no problem at our gross weight, we’ll clear the mountains easily. I’ll back you up on heading and keep an eye out for the leader. Ready?”

  “Ready—I guess,” Daren said.

  “You got the aircraft,” Zane said, giving the control stick a shake.

  Oh, shit, Daren thought. Here we go. “I have the aircraft,” he acknowledged, shaking his control stick in reply.

  The pilot of the lead EB-1C Vampire bomber got clearance for takeoff, taxied off the elevator to the end of the runway, lined up on centerline, locked brakes, lit afterburners, released brakes, and shot down the runway.

  A few seconds after the leader lifted off, Daren locked the brakes and smoothly moved the throttles forward. He paused at the first detent, then smoothly moved the throttles into the afterburner zone. “Good nozzle swing . . . zone five, now . . . brakes off.”

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p; The Vampire bomber leaped forward as if it were shot from a catapult. Daren was pressed hard in his seat. The pressure on his chest was surprising, much more than it had been in the supersonic FB-111. It was hard to believe that a plane this big could accelerate so fast. It seemed only seconds later that Zane announced, “Coming up on rotate speed . . . rotating, now.” Suddenly the Vampire broke ground and soared into the air like an arrow fired into the sky. “Positive rate . . . positive altimeter . . . gear moving.” Daren checked that all the gear lights were out—and by the time he did, the bomber had reached almost three hundred knots.

  “Watch your airspeed—there’s your barber-pole max V,” Grey said. “Don’t be afraid to pull it up. The faster we get to altitude, the better.”

  “Guess I’m a little rusty,” Daren commented. He pulled back more on the stick and retrimmed but found he had to pull and retrim every ten seconds or so to keep the bomber at three-fifty. They were now climbing at well over eight thousand feet per minute. “Christ, she’s like a bat out of hell,” Daren muttered.

  “You got that right, sir,” Grey agreed. “Mission-adaptive technology. The whole airframe becomes a lift-producing device until we hit three hundred knots, and then the computer takes it away little by little, till just a small part of the wing and fuselage produces lift. That way there’s no induced drag caused by a lot of lift-producing surfaces. Sounds weird, but it’s true. The faster we go, the faster we can go. Above four hundred knots almost none of the wing and a tiny fraction of the fuselage is producing lift—the rest is just knifing through the air at zero angle of attack.”

  A few moments later Zane put his right hand on the control stick. “Good job, sir,” he said. He shook the stick. “I have the aircraft. I’ll do the rejoin, check over the leader, then let you try some formation. It’ll get you warmed up for the air refueling.”

  “You got the aircraft,” Daren said. His palms felt clammy inside his gloves. Damn, things happened fast in this machine!

  It did not take long to catch up to the leader, and soon Zane maneuvered his bomber into route formation, five hundred meters to the right, a hundred meters behind, and a hundred meters above the leader. He got on the interplane radio frequency to the other aircraft. “Lead, this is Two, clear me in to fingertip,” he radioed.

  “You’re cleared in to fingertip,” the leader radioed.

  Grey performed an initial join-up, closing in to about a half mile away from the leader’s right wingtip. “That’s a pretty good combat spread position,” he said. He then made an imperceptible stick movement, and slowly they slid toward the leader until the two planes were less than a hundred feet apart. They looked the leader’s aircraft over; then Grey ducked underneath and repositioned himself on the other side. “Want to give it a try, sir?”

  “Think I’m ready, Zane?”

  “We’ll shortly find out, sir.”

  “What’s the trick to fingertip in the Vampire, Zane?”

  “The mission-adaptive computers dampen out most of the bow wave but accentuate the wingtip vortices, so we set up a little farther out than normal. We can’t really tuck it in as tight as a T-38 Talon or T-1 Jayhawk. Nice and easy is the key. I know you have formation experience in the F-111s and various trainer aircraft. With mission-adaptive technology, controlling the Vampire in close is easier than on any other aircraft. All it takes is a light touch on the controls.”

  Daren flexed his neck muscles, shifted slightly in his seat, and looked as if he was taking a deep, nervous breath—but they hadn’t moved an inch yet. “Anytime you’re ready, sir,” Grey prompted him. He was just about to give Mace a few more basic pointers on how to close in to fingertip position when, before Grey or anyone else realized what happened, they were flying within just a few feet of each other, wingtips overlapping. “I’ve got the aircraft! I’ve got the aircraft!” Grey shouted.

  “No,” Daren said calmly. “Hands off.”

  “Two, you guys are a little close,” the lead mission commander radioed.

  “We’re fine,” Daren responded. Grey quickly realized that Mace hadn’t overcorrected or made a mistake—he was purposely tucked in close, the leader’s left wing casting a shadow on the second Vampire. But Mace was in there so close and so tight that it felt as if they were one aircraft.

  “I see what you mean about the wingtip vortices. The trick would be to keep the vortices away from the flight-control surfaces. Look—I’ll move out a few feet. Put your hand on the stick.” When Grey put his hand lightly on the control stick, Daren moved the bomber an imperceptible amount away from the leader. “See that?”

  “No.”

  “Turn off the mission-adaptive computer for a sec.”

  “What?”

  “I said, turn off the MA computer, Zane.”

  “You want to move away first?”

  “No.” To Grey’s horror, Daren keyed his voice-control button: “MAT to standby.” There was a slight burble that caused a thrill of panic to shoot up and down Grey’s spine, but their position did not change one bit. “See it now? The mission-adaptive system masks it out quite a bit. Look—it’ll go away.” He slid in four feet closer, so close that Grey could see the whites in the lead AC’s eyes. “See? It’s gone. You really got to get it in there tight, but the vortices just spill out over the top of our fuselage and overboard along our slipstream.” Daren keyed the interplane channel mike button: “Lead, give me a standard rate turn,” he radioed. “Either direction.”

  There was a long pause, but finally: “Roger. Coming left.”

  The lead Vampire made an ultracautious, much less than standard-rate turn, and the second Vampire turned with him. “See this, Zane?” Daren said. “Once you’re in tight enough to let the vortices spill over the fuselage instead of the wings, the vortices actually help keep you in place.” He moved his hand until he had just one finger and one thumb on the controls. “She’s practically flying herself. I wouldn’t unzip and take a pee, but this gives you enough of a breather to refocus your eyes, check a caution message, or get a kink out.” They turned right to get back on course, and Mace’s Vampire stuck with the leader as if it were welded to him. “Let’s see what it’s like on the other side.” On interplane he radioed, “Lead, Two’s crossing under to the other wing.”

  “Is that you flying, Zane?”

  “Negative. It’s the new guy.”

  “Say again?”

  “It’s the new MC flying,” Zane said proudly. “He’s got liquid nitrogen for blood.”

  Still in the turn, Daren crossed under the lead EB-1, close enough so that they could see seams in the composite fibersteel skin. “Wow. Feel this, Zane—I’m dead in between both wingtip vortices, and it’s as smooth as a baby’s bottom here.” All Zane could think about was smacking into the underside of the lead plane—they were closer than precontact position from an aerial-refueling tanker. But he took the controls and found it incredibly steady. No sign of turbulence or cross-controlling at all. Daren tried it with the mission-adaptive system on, and it was even smoother.

  He backed away to a more reasonable position. “Nice job in the groove, Nitro,” the pilot of the lead bomber remarked.

  “I think you’ve just been named, sir,” Grey said.

  “ ‘Nitro,’ huh? It’s a helluva lot better than ‘Pappy,’ “ Daren said. He moved away to route-formation position and gave control back to the flight-control computer.

  “Shit-hot job, sir,” Grey said. “I got the impression you didn’t like flying.”

  “Nah,” Daren said. “Just because I don’t think mission commanders need to be experts in flying the jet, or because I think I shouldn’t be wasting time learning flight characteristics, doesn’t mean I can’t fly. But I prefer dropping bombs, my friend. I’ll get our range clearance, and then we’ll go in and have some real fun!”

  BATTLE MOUNTAIN AIR RESERVE BASE

  Later that afternoon

  Daren had to struggle to keep up with the squadron as they headed dow
n the aircraft-parking ramp for the finish line. His newest squadron joint activity: letting everyone off at 4:00 p.m. on Friday afternoon and doing a five-kilometer run around the runway, followed by a tailgate beer and soda party hosted by one of the squadron’s duty flights, rotated each week. He was heartened to see everyone who was not on critical duty, and even a few others who had a quick-response responsibility, out for the run. He was also pleasantly surprised when Patrick McLanahan, David Luger, and a bunch of other Air Battle Force types joined in the run with Rebecca Furness, John Long, and a few other wing personnel he hadn’t even met yet.

  The afternoon air was cold and dry, much different from the humid air in the District of Columbia and Alabama, but his body was finally getting accustomed to the dryness and altitude, and Daren felt he acquitted himself well despite obviously being the old man in the group. He felt that more than just a few folks had to slow up so they wouldn’t completely wax their squadron commander, and there was a big clump of squadron personnel who finished beside Daren and Rebecca. John Long, a three-per-day cigar smoker, dropped out after three kilometers, the minimum distance for the twice-annual Air Force aerobics test; almost no one else dropped out, although a few had to stop and take some deep breaths and rest aching legs.

  Daren first chose a large bottle of icy-cold water after the run, but then he took one look at the disappointed faces of his squadron, put it back, and pulled out a bottle of beer instead, then handed one to Rebecca. This gave the go-ahead for everyone else, and the partying started in earnest. “Good move, Colonel,” Rebecca said as they walked along the dirt beside the Security Forces building. “You saw that everyone wanted a beer, but no one was going to partake unless you did first. Very heads-up of you to switch.”

  “Thanks.”